Today I want to talk about upselling.
January, February, March depending on quite when Easter is, is usually a very quiet time in hospitality. There are regional variations but it’s the traditional quiet time, December was mad including mad Friday but now you’ve got to look at all the ways that you can stretch the money you took in December through to the start of season which usually starts around April and March with Easter.
So one of the things you’ve got to do is teach your staff how to upsell.
This doesn’t have to be in your face, we’re all used to upselling if you go onto Amazon or Ebay there is always people that have brought this also bought this, that or the other, or they brought package of stuff. All you’re doing is educating your customers, giving them proper service, you’re not in their face, it’s not big American that way of selling, which I personally don’t like, but yeah fit’s some.
It’s teaching staff, make sure you have a team meeting before the start of the session, tell them what needs to shift, if you’re on your pump or your bar and don’t sell food, it might be you’ve got some real ale that is getting near the end, tell your staff, make sure they push that.
It might be that you decide to discount that stock – make sure you staff know.
It might be that you need to be telling the staff that if somebody comes in for a shandy to use that particular beer rather than usual one. Just a way of getting stock used so it’s not a total loss.
If you’re running a food operation, you need to tell your staff what your specials are if you’ve run specials. Specials are a great way of getting rid of stock that might be going short-dated of maximised cuts of meat etc. But you are only gonna do that if you tell your staff about those dishes.
The other thing is to teach staff to be aware of what’s going on the tables.
When they’re clearing the starters away, if there is empty glasses, get them to ask your customers if they would like a refill. The last thing you want to do as a customer is as a meal is brought to you is have to go up, leave warm food getting cold while you go and queue at a bar.